Looking so innocent
I might believe you if I didn’t know
Could’ve loved you all my life
If you hadn’t left me waiting in the cold
And you got your share of secrets
And I’m tired of being last to know
And now you’re asking me to listen
Cause it’s worked each time before
– You’re Not Sorry (Taylor’s Version), Taylor Swift
Friday, November 14, 2008
General Hospital: Conference Room
Anna paused at the threshold of the room, then pursed her lips when she took in Robin and Patrick sitting on one of the side of the table, Alexis at the head. “Oh, you can’t really think you need a lawyer present. Robin—”
Alexis lifted a hand. “I’d rather if you addressed me and not my clients directly.”
“Robin,” Mac said, coming in behind his former-sister-in-law. “I know you’re upset, but there are some questions that need to be answered. I got a call from the Port Charles Herald. They’re running a story in the morning that the Angel Without Mercy died a few days ago.” He tipped his head. “That would be Jolene Crowell. Sister to Nadine. Former nurse.”
“The hospital doesn’t comment on patient records,” Alexis said coolly. “My clients did not agree to have a conversation with anyone other than a representative from the WSB. If that’s changed, we’ll have to reschedule this meeting after I’ve had time to confer with them on local concerns.”
“Robin, no one’s looking to get you in any trouble,” Mac said, exasperated. “We know that this is about the Zaccharas and Jason Morgan. Something happened to Elizabeth all those weeks ago, didn’t it? That’s why Jason was so distracted the morning of Sonny’s shooting. Now something’s happened to Jolene, too. Is Anthony Zacchara coming after Jason? Was he behind Elizabeth’s accident or her complications?”
“You’re no better than Scott,” Robin said with some disgust. “Either of you. All you ever see is the mob. Alexis—”
“We’re done here—” The lawyer began.
“I’ll leave,” Mac interrupted. He jabbed a finger at his niece. “But I’m going to be investigating Jolene. Unless you give me a damn good reason, my first stop is going to be Nadine—”
“So you’re going to question a woman who’s just lost her sister with nothing but your best guess. This is ridiculous.” Robin took a deep breath, scrubbed her hands down her face. “I am so angry at you,” she said finally. Though she didn’t look up and kept her eyes trained on the table, everyone knew who she was talking to. “So unbelievably furious.”
Anna leaned forward. “Robin, you have to understand. I never meant to hurt you. I had no idea you were involved—”
“And you still don’t.” Robin lifted her eyes, shimmering with tears. “You have nothing but your best guess about any of this. But that doesn’t matter to you. Patrick, Elizabeth, Jason, our families, GH, none of that matters. You were going to haul my fiancé into the interrogation room and toss Jason right after him, and why? Why? Because you have suspicions? Why did you have to do it this way? Why couldn’t you just tell me the truth?”
“I wish I had, but—”
“But your cases are secret.” She scrubbed her cheeks. “And you, Uncle Mac. You knew why she was here, didn’t you?”
Mac hesitated, traded a glance with his niece, then nodded. “I did. I’m sorry—”
“Whatever. Whatever. I don’t want this. I don’t want this,” she told Patrick. “We’ve done nothing wrong.”
“No, we haven’t.” Patrick took her hand in his, held it tight, then looked at Alexis. “Go ahead. Give them the statement we prepared. But we’re not answering any other questions. You want something from us or the hospital, you’ll go through the legal channels.”
“This isn’t how I wanted it,” Anna said, but she sat down. “I hope you’ll see that in time.”
“If you wanted something different, then you should have told the truth. But that’s done now.”
Alexis slid her on her reading glasses. “All right. I’m going to read a prepared statement, and remind you both that any further questions should be submitted to me in writing and I will confer with my clients. On Wednesday, October 1, Elizabeth Webber’s vitals crashed. She went into cardiac arrest and was rushed into emergency surgery. She was suffering from internal bleeding caused by the car accident she’d suffered a few days earlier. At the time of her original surgery, the medical report diagnosed her with a bruised kidney that would heal on its own. However, it began to bleed with no warning or immediate cause. The original surgeon, Leo Ramsey, and the chief of staff, Patrick Drake, ordered a toxicology report and learned that rather than being given three doses of fentanyl over a period of twelve hours, Elizabeth was given warfarin, a blood thinner that induced bleeding.”
Anna pursed her lips. “Medical sabotage,” she said to Mac. “It’s what we suspected.”
“To distract Jason,” Mac said with a nod. He looked at Patrick. “Why wasn’t this reported to the authorities?”
Alexis answered instead, looking back at the statement. “It was reported to the hospital board of directors and investigated internally to ascertain whether it was a mistake or deliberate. It appears that a known glitch in the dispensary coding was to blame. This glitch had been dutifully noted and reported repeatedly between July and September of this year. The nurses would put in their codes for a specific medication, and the machine would dispense the wrong meds. Systems were put in place to prevent any medications being administered to the patients by mistake, but this particular floor hadn’t experienced a glitch prior to this. As Elizabeth was the first known patient to have a complication, with some worry that her family would sue the hospital, the investigation continued. The dispensary machines were investigated thoroughly. The glitch was fixed, and new machines have been installed. A cyber security expert has secured the entire mainframe.”
Anna narrowed her eyes, then looked across the table at Patrick and Robin. “And you still didn’t report it to Mac? Someone tried to kill Elizabeth—”
“My client reported it to the board of directors, and it was handled internally to the satisfaction of everyone, including Elizabeth and her family. No further incidents have occurred, and a database is being built to investigate all prior glitches to ensure there were no patients affected that have slipped through the cracks.”
Robin watched her mother consider that answer, and knew they’d covered their bases thoroughly when Anna just made a face. “What about Jolene Crowell?” her mother asked.
“Jolene Crowell died this last Tuesday from a cardiac arrest. She was a long-term coma patient with a slim chance of revival. An autopsy was ordered, as the hospital worried about their liability with regards to pending litigation from last year’s events. The preliminary report suggests there was a digoxin toxicity that led to a seizure and cardiac arrest.”
“Digoxin—” Anna straightened. “Now how—”
“This can occur from any number of things, including some long-term therapies. With a comatose patient who is not able to report some of the symptoms, more investigation is needed. A more extensive toxicology report has been ordered. This has been authorized by the patient’s family. If this report suggests that there was any malfeasance, it will be reported to the proper authorities.” Alexis set her statement down, removed her glasses. “That concludes our statement.”
Anna tapped her fingers impatiently. “You must have investigated more than just that—”
“That concludes our statement,” Alexis repeated, and Anna closed her mouth. “Any further questions should be directed in writing.”
“Keeping me in the dark about what’s happening—” Anna leaned forward. “Robin, you must see that if you don’t tell me the truth, you’re only prolonging this. Someone could get hurt—”
“The only person to blame in this room is you.” Robin slid her chair back, wincing slightly as she climbed to her feet, Patrick holding her steady. “You told us Karpov was in pharmaceuticals. You knew that when you came here. You could have come to us. Asked us for information. But you wanted to play spy. You wanted to be undercover, to ask Patrick questions when he was too tired to think. To wait until I was out of the room—” Her voice faltered. “To ask me questions about my friends, my family, the people who loved me when you couldn’t or wouldn’t — you made me think you cared about me. But you were investigating us all along, Mom. Someone did get hurt, but don’t worry. I know exactly where I rank for you. And for my father. You notice that he’s not here either, don’t you?” She looked Patrick. “I want to go.”
Coffee House: Office
“You asked for more time?” Cody frowned, folded his arms. “What’s there to wait about? You say yes.”
Jason shook his head, closed the office door, then went over to the desk, leaned against it. “I need to talk to Elizabeth. I’m not going to agree to something on her behalf without talking to her about it. But even then, I don’t think it’s a good idea.”
“Because it involves her or because Ric Lansing is the one who asked? Don’t scowl at me,” Cody said. “It’s my job to push you when you’re being an idiot, remember? You told me that if I disagreed with you, I needed to say something. Well, I’m saying something. We thought something was up with Johnny Zacchara after the sister died. You know someone killed Jolene to get to Johnny. Now Johnny’s trying to make peace with his father, and Anthony is coming to us to add on to that. So either Anthony’s worried, too, or maybe he also wants to be sure the kid is safe up here. How is this anything but a good idea?”
Jason grimaced, then rubbed the back of his neck. “When you lay it out like that, okay, there’s sense there. If we were dealing with a normal person. But Anthony Zacchara is a psychotic animal who only keeps his power through fear. His promise isn’t worth the paper it’s written on. Did I tell you what he did to Elizabeth during the ball last year?” he demanded.
“Not in detail, no, but—”
“He kidnapped her from the ballroom where my sister was laying dead,” Jason said flatly. “Dragged her up to the parapet and put her on the ledge. When I got there—” He looked away. “He told me if I didn’t get up there, too, he’d push her. And he didn’t know Elizabeth, who she was, that she was connected to me—”
“That part—” Cody said, jabbing a finger at him. “That’s the part you need to let go. You gotta stop thinking there’s a man alive who works on the East Coast who does not know who Elizabeth Webber is. I’ve been around a year, Jason. I came on after the trial, and I thought maybe we’d be asked to guard her. And we were — but we weren’t supposed to let her know. Not to be seen. I asked Francis why.”
“This isn’t relevant—”
“I asked Francis why,” Cody said again, speaking over Jason who just glared at him. “And he told me it’s because you’re an idiot who’s been pretending for eight years that our side of the world doesn’t know about her. They know you threatened to take Joseph Sorel apart just for looking at her. They know Sonny put guards on her when Sorel got too close. They know Roscoe’s men kidnapped her, that Luis Alcazar shot at her, that Ric Lansing targeted her because of your relationship, that you rescued her from Manny Ruiz—”
Jason exhaled slowly. “Look—”
“You need to stop pretending you can keep her out of this world,” Cody said bluntly. “She’s not running away. You are. If you go home and you tell her you have a way to keep the peace, to keep her children safe, and to bind Anthony Zacchara in the eyes of the rest of the syndicate to that peace — and you’re not taking it because it means she has to walk across a goddamn room and talk to a woman she already knows and works with—she’s going to think you’re an idiot. My job is to keep you safe. Which means keeping your family safe. You have to let me do that job, Jason, or there’s no point to any of this.”
Jason straightened, went around to the other side of the desk, sat down, and took a long deep breath. “Are you done?”
“No, have you told her you’re trying to get out?”
Jason hesitated. “No. Not yet.”
“Why?” Cody demanded. “It’s been six months since we started to shut down the routes. You haven’t pushed through a single shipment since the shooting. You’re out—”
“I’ll never be out. Not all the way, and you know that.” Jason shook his head. “And there’s no way to know for sure if it’ll hold. I don’t want her to get her hopes up until I know—”
“Why? Because if you fail, she’ll leave? This just goes back to the same place. You think you can keep her separate, and you can’t. You still expect her to walk away, and it’s just bullshit.” He stopped. “Now I’m done.”
Jason dipped his head considered all that Cody had said, wanting to reject it—and not finding a single false statement. “It’s not comforting to know,” he finally said, “that choices I made years ago kept Elizabeth tied to me. To think that it’s been out of my control all this time.”
“Well, if you want comfort, you’re in the wrong business. And it’s not one single choice you made years ago. It’s all the choices you made. And that’s before we even talk about the trial and what everyone and their mothers have known since Lansing asked that question. Everyone knew she lied. You just have to look at your kid and know the truth. So go home, and ask Elizabeth to do this. Tell her what’s going on. All of it. Then let me talk to Lansing. I’ll arrange the details so you don’t have to deal with him again.”
“Yeah. Yeah, okay.” Jason scrubbed his hands over his face. “Thank you, I guess. For calling me an idiot.”
“Don’t make me do it again.”
General Hospital: Chief of Staff’s Office
Elizabeth leaned against the open door frame and folded her arms. “You’re doing paperwork, so am I allowed to hope that the meeting went well?”
Patrick scribbled his name at the bottom of a contract, then glanced up at her before turning his attention to the paperwork. “Just trying to clear the back log before I get hauled off to jail.”
Elizabeth wrinkled her nose, came forward, and closed the door. “Should Jason and I be worried?”
“No. Not yet.” Patrick leaned back, tossing the pen on the desk blotter. “But Anna brought Mac, and he’s probably already putting together an investigation on Jolene. Going to Scott for a subpoena—” He shook his head. “Maybe we shouldn’t have given them anything. Maybe I should have called Mac months ago.”
Elizabeth perched on the edge of the chair. “We wanted to protect the hospital, and you covered yourself by making sure my grandmother and Jason knew what happened to me. They supported the choice to keep this internal. Patrick—”
“Jolene was murdered in this hospital, and whoever killed her is in the wind. We don’t know who, we barely know how, and I still haven’t told Nadine.” He looked at her. “And I don’t know if I’m allowed to ask this, but is Jason doing anything on his end to deal with Johnny? Is he looking into what the hell Johnny’s got himself into? Matt confirmed what we thought — no one called him. How did he know to be at the hospital?”
“I don’t know much about Johnny,” Elizabeth said after some hesitation. “Jason knows him better. He’s made choices this last year to protect Johnny, usually from Sonny. We haven’t really talked about it much because like Jason said, this isn’t about him.”
“You don’t think that’s strange? Jolene Crowell gets murdered down the hall from where Sonny is a patient? In the same hospital where you come to work every day? Jason’s not the least bit curious about how that happened? This is the same man who traveled halfway around the world to find the vaccine during the encephalitis outbreak. That wasn’t really about his business either. The Metro Court? He didn’t sit back and let that happen either.”
“People that mattered to Jason were involved. Sam’s brother was sick, Sonny was sick. I asked him to find Lucky. And the Metro Court? Come on, Patrick. I was inside. So was Sam. His father, his mother, his best friend. Of course Jason was going to get involved there. Do I think it’s strange Jason isn’t jumping at the bit to stop this? To hunt Johnny down for answers? I don’t know. Maybe.”
“I think he knows something—”
“Whoever did this to Jolene wanted to send a message to Johnny. And we can guess that Johnny got the message. How do we know that someone isn’t watching? Waiting for Jason to get involved? What if that triggers something? I don’t know, Patrick. Maybe Jason isn’t in a hurry to bring down chaos and violence again. It’s been quiet since Sonny’s shooting.” Elizabeth hesitated. “Do you want me to talk to Jason? I can do that, Patrick. If that makes this easier for you, I will.”
Patrick picked up the pen again, tapped it against the blotter. “I don’t know. I just want this over with. What am I supposed to say to Robin? To fix this for her?”
“I wish I knew. I’m so sorry that her suspicions were right, that her mother came here to investigate. All you can do is be there for her. She’s dealing with a lot — and I know my emotions were a complete mess after I gave birth. Right now, you’re probably doing everything you can. She wanted to take the legal route and call in a lawyer, and you’re doing that.”
Elizabeth got to her feet. “I’ll talk to Jason tonight, all right? You’re not wrong. If Johnny’s into something, if he’s in trouble, it’ll find its way to our door. It always does.”
Metro Court Hotel: Carly’s Office
“With the prenuptial agreement signed prior to the marriage, it’s really just a matter of drawing up some paperwork. And deciding whether you want to keep the house or sell—” Diane continued to speak, but Carly had stopped listening. She stood at the window in her office, watching the grounds crew working in the gardens.
“Carly?”
“Whatever you think is fine,” Carly said, absently. When Diane said nothing else, she turned, furrowed her brow at the lawyer. “What?”
Diane capped her pen and laid it down on the paperwork she’d set on the desk. “There’s no hurry to deal with this paperwork. If you’re not ready—”
“It’s not even my first divorce,” Carly said. She turned, went to the desk, and picked up the petition. “I should be able to do this in my sleep by now.” She looked at her lawyer. “Have you ever been married?”
“Oh, absolutely not. I can’t imagine sharing my living space with a man.” Diane shuddered. “He might want me to clean out my closet, and well, I won’t part with my shoes for just anyone.” Her lips twitched. “But I’ve been tempted a time or two.”
“I don’t know why anyone gets married. Why I even bothered.” She flicked through the pages of the prenuptial agreement. She’d barely read it before signing, so sure that this time it would be different. Jax knew her, inside and out, and he loved her anyway.
It was the anyway that was sticking these days — Jax knew who Carly was and was willing to put up with her flaws. Sonny had been the same. Lorenzo and AJ had been means to an end —
Jason had loved her, but he hadn’t wanted to and he’d never been happy about it. And it was never the way Carly wanted.
“Carly, we really don’t have to do this today,” Diane said again. “I haven’t heard a peep from Jax’s attorney—are you sure there isn’t a chance that you might be able to work things out?”
“I thought so. I thought maybe he’d forgive me, that he’d understand that I’d done something terrible, that I knew it, and that I wanted very badly to undo it. I thought if I just waited, he might come around.” Carly lifted her eyes from the paperwork to Diane. “Did you know he and Olivia kept Sonny from seeing Kate?”
Diane pressed her lips together, then nodded. “Yes. Sonny called me a few times that week. He wanted me to fight it. I put together something for the board, but it didn’t get very far. Carly—”
“The day he was shot, before he went to the pier, he was at GH. Trying to see Kate. And Jax still refused.” Carly rubbed her temple. “He did it because he’d been angry at Sonny for years, because of what I did, and he did it because he could. And now Morgan’s lost his father. I know it’s not fair to hold that against him. I know he never meant it to happen this way. I know all of that, but I can’t stop being angry.”
“It’s been a very difficult year.” Diane reached across the desk for the divorce paperwork, and Carly released it. “Let me reach out to Alexis. Let her know we’re talking about this. Maybe we can set up some sort of mediation. I’d be very sorry, Carly, if you and Jax lost each other after everything else.”
“I thought time would fix things, that letting everything settle would give me some peace. Some time to think and calm.” Carly sat down, reached for some other work on her desk, something to keep her busy. Distracted. “But maybe that was a mistake. I feel like I’m still frozen, like there’s a part of me, still standing in a hospital hallway, listening to doctors tell me my son will never wake up.”
“Carly—”
“I need to update my will,” Carly interrupted, and Diane pressed her lips together. “Morgan. I want Morgan to go with Jason. Can you do that?”
“Of course. I’ll call you when the paperwork is ready to sign.”
Drake Condo: Living Room
Matt crossed the threshold hesitantly, his hands in the pockets of his trousers, his dark eyes scanning the room.
“He’s not here,” Robin told him, closing the door. He turned to face her, and she smiled faintly. “I thought that would be easier for you.”
“Oh. Uh, I thought maybe he had more questions about my conversation with Nadine.” Matt rocked back on his heels, cleared his throat. “Or Jolene’s case. Is everything okay? Did you touch base with your mom?”
Robin exhaled carefully. “You could say that.” She tucked a piece of hair behind her ear, then crossed the room where Emma lay in the bassinet. She lifted the baby and turned back to Matt. “I’ll update you on how that went, but I invited you over to meet your niece. Officially.”
Matt’s hands remained in his pockets, and some of the color drained from his face. “What?”
“I know you and Patrick are still uneasy around each other, and I don’t imagine that will go away overnight.” Robin stopped a few feet from him. “But you really stepped up, Matt, and came through for him in a big way. For both of us. You don’t know either of us well, and you’re new to GH. I want you to know that I appreciate what you did.”
“I’m just doing what’s right. You don’t have to—oh, okay—” Matt winced as Robin laid the newborn in his arms. “You always forget how little they are, don’t you?” he wondered. “I have textbooks from med school that are heavier.”
“Seems impossible, I know.” Robin stroked her daughter’s cheek with the back of her knuckle. “Something so small and perfect was created from nothing, and she’ll grow up to be a person with thoughts and actions and mistakes.” She lifted her gaze to his. “What Noah did to you is awful. And you never, ever have to be okay with him. I promise that no one in this family will ever encourage you to think of him as anything other than a terrible person.”
“I don’t want to think about it anymore,” Matt said, with a quick shake of his head. “Since I came to Port Charles, since I realized what hospital this is, I haven’t been able to stop thinking about it. I appreciate what you’re doing here, but—”
“My mother did something awful, too. Not as bad, I guess, but it sure feels like she broke something,” Robin said. Matt closed his mouth. “She came to Port Charles because she suspected Andrei Karpov was up to something. She thought he was messing around in the clinic where you and Nadine were working. She lied to me, Matt. And used my connection, my friendship with Jason to pump me for information. And when she suspected something was wrong at GH, she didn’t say anything. Didn’t offer to help. She kept lying, kept using me to question Patrick. I thought she was here to be my mother, to be Emma’s grandmother. Maybe part of her was—” Robin looked away, rubbed a fist against her chest. “But it doesn’t change what she did. How much it hurts. That’s the update. I went to tell my mother what we knew, and well, she was already planning to drag Patrick and Jason in for questioning.”
Matt frowned. “That’s—I’m so sorry. That sucks. It more than sucks, but I just can’t think of a word awful enough—”
“Parents disappoint us. I guess we have no choice but to let them be human. Terrible, flawed humans who make mistakes. They make choices that hurt us. I don’t know if I can forgive her. If we’ll ever get back what I thought we had.” Robin touched Emma’s fuzzy hair, then smiled at Matt. “We don’t have to keep the family we were born with. Sometimes we’re better off making our own. Noah’s mistakes made you and Patrick related. That doesn’t have to make you family. But if you want it, if you want to be part of it, we’re here.”
Morgan Penthouse: Master Bedroom
Elizabeth emerged from the bathroom, towel drying her hair and wrinkling her nose. “It’s going to be impossible to get the spaghetti sauce out of their clothes.” She watched Jason strip off his shirt. “And ours.”
“I should have cut up the meatballs,” he told her. “I didn’t expect them to start throwing them at each other.”
Elizabeth laughed, then sat on the edge of the bed. “No, they definitely do a great job pretending to be angelic, perfect boys, don’t they? You never expect chaos.”
Jason set his shirt next to hers. “I’ll soak them before we do the laundry this weekend.” He tossed his jeans into the hamper — they’d escaped the mayhem and went to the dresser for a pair of sweatpants.
“We haven’t really had a chance to talk about what happened when Patrick and Robin met with Anna.”
Jason tugged the sweats over his hips, furrowed his brow. “No, we haven’t. I can understand why they’re reluctant to turn over everything we know about Jolene’s death. The way Robin said it, she overheard her mother threatening to pull me and Patrick in for questioning. Doesn’t seem like Anna is as friendly as we hoped.”
“I talked to Patrick afterwards, and he’s supporting however Robin wants to handle this right now, but he’s frustrated. He wanted to hand this off and be done with it. I know we wanted the same thing. Instead, it just keeps going.”
He sat next to her. “Yeah, and since we’re on that subject, I heard from Anthony Zacchara today.” He paused. “He sent Ric to talk to me.”
“I’m sure you loved that,” Elizabeth said, and Jason made a face. “What did Ric have to say?”
Jason reached for her hand, pulled it into his lap, lacing their fingers together. “Johnny’s looking for some extra reassurance of Nadine’s safety. I think we can say for sure now that we were right. That Jolene was a message. I don’t know what he told his father, but coming so close to what happened—”
“Sounds like he understood the message they were trying to send.”
“Yeah. Looks like Johnny is hoping he can make Nadine untouchable. No one would go after a Zacchara kid—”
Except Sonny, he thought, but he left that unspoken, and mercifully, so did she. “What does he need from you?”
“It’s…an old tradition,” Jason said after a long moment. “But with all the bad blood between the Zaccharas and us this last year — we can show a united front to people who matter. Anthony’s going to have dinner with Johnny and Nadine at the No Name. He wants us to go. Not to eat with them. But to be in the same room.”
“Well, that sounds easy enough. What’s the catch?”
Now came the tricky part. He wasn’t ready to talk to her about his future plans. No matter what Cody said, Jason knew he wasn’t ready to put the idea in Elizabeth’s head, to make her think there was a chance that their life could be safe. Not until he was sure. But he’d have to tell her that he’d delayed giving Ric an answer—and she’d want to know why.
“The catch is that you have to go to the table alone and talk to Johnny and Nadine. Wish them well on their marriage. Tell Nadine you’re sorry about her sister, probably. And loudly enough so the next table can hear it.” Jason grimaced. “I hate it—”
“But you told them yes, didn’t you?” Elizabeth said. “Jason, you agreed, didn’t you?” When he remained quiet, she sighed, stroked his cheek with the tips of her fingers. “No, of course you didn’t. Let me guess. They requested it. You said no the minute you heard my name, and for some reason, now you’re having second thoughts.”
“I said no but then I told them I’d think about it.” He grimaced. “You’re mad.”
“No. Not mad. Not surprised either. Just frustrated.” She pushed lightly on his chest until he slid back, and she climbed onto the bed, planting a knee on either of his body, resting her bottom on his thighs. “Are we in this together or aren’t we?”
“We are.”
“This seems like such a small easy thing I can do. I’m going to guess that it might not be a tradition anymore because Sonny used to be in charge, and he’d never agree to something like this.”
“No. He wanted Carly out of this. Thought she was loose cannon. But it used to be—” Jason paused. “Common, I guess, for some socialization. At least among some of the organizations. I hate this—”
“I know you do. And it’s not like I want to do it. But maybe it gives you a chance to talk to Johnny. You’ll have leverage against him. Because sure, this kind of thing puts Nadine under Anthony’s protection, but doesn’t it also mean you can’t touch them either? Since everyone sort of knows what happened to Sonny, even if they can’t prove it.”
“Yeah. It’s a mutual thing.”
“So you can use this to get answers from Johnny, maybe. Or at least let him know you’re on to him. And it’s a way that I can help. An acceptable way. All I have to do is get dressed up, have dinner with the man I love, and talk to someone I already like?” Elizabeth shrugged. “Easy yes for me. You have to be open to letting me do these small things, Jason.”
“I know. Cody yelled at me earlier. Apparently—” He felt the flush of embarrassment rising in his cheeks. “Apparently, no one believed you at the trial last year. And they thought I was an idiot for trying to pretend all this last year that you weren’t…that Jake wasn’t…”
“I figured when no one was really surprised by Jake’s paternity. Even Lucky, who maybe wanted to believe it.” Elizabeth combed her fingers through his hair, sliding her fingers down his cheek. “Cody’s not wrong. You always thought it would be enough to walk away from me, and it never was. We always circled back to this. We were kind of inevitable,” she teased, and he smiled at her. “Call Cody or whoever else you need to talk to. Tell him to say yes and get it over with sooner rather than later. Johnny’s in trouble, and I don’t want anyone else to get caught up in what’s going to happen.”
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